World Peace said he had not contacted Harden yet because the two could — actually, almost certainly will at this point — meet in the next round and he wants to maintain the edge between them, but he did reach out to second parties to see if Harden was okay. Also, he danced around what he thought about the punishment, instead expressing former players not criticizing him.

If the Lakers close out the Nuggets Tuesday, World Peace would return for Game 2 of the Lakers series against the Thunder.